SuperLiga is upon us once more, but just how significant is the tournament? Goal.com's Sylvestre Adame says the tournament has a long way to go before reaching the "significant" stage.

By Sylvestre Adame

The
third edition of the SuperLiga is just around the corner. The
tournament will again showcase four of the top teams from both the U.S.
and Mexico.

But is the SuperLiga really all that it’s cracked up to be?

Founded
in 2007 the SuperLiga was intended to sell the fierce rivalry that
exists between the U.S. and Mexico. They did just so in the dramatic
final between the Galaxy and Pachuca. It came down to penalties and
Pachuca’s goalkeeper Miguel Calero had a marvelous performance to give
his team the win in the inaugural year. The second year of the
SuperLiga was a bit different though.

Let’s suppose that this
year’s UEFA Champions League final was not played by Barcelona but
rather Chelsea. The final would not have had the same flare as the one
we were treated to. We see Manchester play Chelsea all the time so to
have something different like a Barcelona-Manchester was a match made
in heaven.

The 2008 SuperLiga final was played out by the
Houston Dynamo and the New England Revolution. It was a great game
between these two bitter rivals but something was missing. Yes a
Mexican team was missing. The final, although a great game, did not
have the same flavor as the one before. After all this tournament was
designed to pit the best from Mexico against the best from the U.S.

Is that really happening though?

SuperLiga’s
main advertising focus is who is the best U.S. or Mexico. It is really
hard to say when we are not actually always watching the very best from
each country. Look at these years’ participants, there is something
very odd about the list. Where is Columbus at? Where is Houston at?
Where is Toluca? Where is Cruz Azul? These were the best teams in 2008
and yet there is not one trace of them in the SuperLiga 2009 edition.
The reason for their absence is simple. These four teams qualified for
a more respected Champions League spot, therefore excluding them from
SuperLiga play.

Here now is the breakdown of the “best teams” from each country and their overall standings for 2008.

Yes
San Luis is ranked first, but that is only based on the regular season
points. Toluca won the 2008 Apertura and Cruz Azul was the runner up.
What about the powerhouses like Chivas and America? Chivas were ranked
higher than both Santos and Atlas and yet they have nothing to do with
the SuperLiga. Chivas along with Pumas declined to participate in the
tournament. When someone like Chivas and Pumas decline to play then you
know you don’t have a good product.

The tournament is solely
based in the U.S. and if it ever wants to go anywhere it needs to
expand. All the games are played on American soil and that needs to
change. There needs to be games in Mexico. There are a lot of Mexican
supporters here in the U.S. but the atmosphere is just not the same.
You don’t get the chants, you don’t get the stands lit up with flares,
and you don’t get the occasional cup full of urine thrown at you when
your team loses. That is all a part of the game: the traveling, the jet
lag, and the hostile fans. The games need to be held in Mexican venues
as well.

Is the tournament really necessary? Whenever it hits,
the MLS season is in full swing while the Mexican League is just
getting back from Cancun. The only reason why a Mexican team would even
play is to get ready for their upcoming season. They take it as
exhibition games, and who wants to risk injury to their best players
before the season starts? For MLS, they have a tight enough schedule
having to deal with the regular season and the U.S. Open Cup. There is
really no need to go out and exhaust your players on a tournament that
does not have many credentials to it.

This tournament is only
beneficial to the teams who have nothing to lose and a lot to gain. The
spectators are the ones losing - we are not really treated with the
best. The expectation is to see something like the U.S. vs. Mexico
games but on many occasions it has fallen short of that. There needs to
be an asterisk on the “best four” from each country because that is not
what we are getting.

The SuperLiga is nowhere near a decent
tournament like the UEFA Cup or even Copa Libertadores. There is a big
tradition gap between the two countries when it comes to football, a
gap which is nonexistent when you talk about other great tournaments
around the world. A lot has to change if this tournament wants to stay
alive in North America.